Your elbow and your rear end seldom have regular contact.  They can only be in the same place with, I think, extreme difficulty.  Mistaking an elbow for a rear end brings into view the depths to which modern discourse has sunk.  There is no fine human being with racist tendencies.  There is no law that gives life.  There is no identification of a Supreme Creator without a steady stream of praise for his saving graces.

Saving grace and the masked saviour

Let us separate the Creator from the rest.  The prayers (Psalms) and the instructions to the Jewish people are witnesses that the Creator has been busy maintaining and repairing his work.

The slightly disguised saviour keeps his work alive.  He is described as majestic and doing wonders.  This is salvation – wholeness and restoration – in God’s  work before the Word becane flesh. Here is Psalm 104 and a panorama of the Creator’s maintenance works, including providing home space.

• (10) He sends forth springs in the valleys; They flow between the mountains; 11) They give drink to every beast of the field; The wild donkeys quench their thirst.
• (12) Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell; They lift up their voices among the branches. 13) He waters the mountains from His upper chambers; The earth is satisfied with the fruit of His works.
• (14) He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, And vegetation for the labor of man, So that he may bring forth food from the earth,
• (15) And wine which makes man’s heart glad, So that he may make his face glisten with oil, And food which sustains man’s heart. (16) The trees of the Lord drink their fill, The cedars of Lebanon which He planted,
• (17) Where the birds build their nests, And the stork, whose home is the fir trees. (18) The high mountains are for the wild goats; The cliffs are a refuge for the shephanim.

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Four layers of Lamb adoration from all creatures

And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.”

Revelation of John 5:13

The person responsible for creating the universe also holds it together according to Colossians 1:16.

For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities–all things have been created through Him and for Him.

Colossians 1:17 continues to testify to Christ’s eminence.

He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

People confusing elbow with rear end is the result of mutation, deformation and a brutal approach to knowledge.   Fine human beings are going to have God’s attributes: mercy, generosity,  justice, and the absence of deceit and homicidal desires.  Saving the best for last in word or deed works only when the last is the indisputable best.  Securing that achievement calls for associating the message or action with the one and only Saviour who is also the one and only Creator.

If you thought that ethical standards were merely a matter of keeping one, four, six, ten, or 6 hundred orders spoken by God or his servants now is not a bad time to think kindly about the testing the ancient Hebrews had to wrestle with. Diet, clothing, and tangible things are the least of God’s ideas for making people holy.

Joel 3:5-8

5) Since you have taken My silver and My gold, brought My precious treasures to your temples, 6) and sold the sons of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks in order to remove them far from their territory,

7) behold, I am going to arouse them from the place where you have sold them, and return your recompense on your head. 8) Also I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the sons of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans, to a distant nation,” for the Lord has spoken.

God approves human trafficking?

7) behold, I am going to arouse them from the place where you have sold them, and return your recompense on your head. 8) Also I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the sons of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans, to a distant nation,” for the Lord has spoken.

Joel 3:7-8

Why, oh why do the slave traders, the chosen nations, and their prophets think that they have divine permission to traffic in human souls and will not face the music? God has always done things humans are not alliwed to do.

Traffic in humans is indictable and recommended as a life lesson for the traders.

People in the third millennium after Samuel’s jaw-dropping verdict on Eli’s house do experience an ear-tingling boost towards seeing what Yahweh sees. That is us, pretending to enjoy all kinds of ground-breaking developments, firsts in scientific discoveries, exciting expressions in the arts, and wilder horizons in physical esthetics, all the while trampling all over our own ancestral treasures, while having no contemporary distinction. Our communities, cultural, religious and political, have endured attacks and tolerated efforts to erase our footprints. At some point this generation has to reckon with our ghosts of heroic bad guys and juvenile grown-ups. The gatekeepers of religion and politics have some tough rowing to do after spending about three decades of backpedalling the historic message of the Son of Man. Alas, we live in the generation like Christs, crooked and perverse, like Eli’s, unheeding and greedy, and like Timothy’s, still crooked and perverse, and in for an ear-tingling.

[from Paul and Timothy] … that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world…

Letter to the Philippians. 2:15

Prime Ministers, Presidents, and Stable Geniuses, Take Note:
a. your houses may be touched by Yahweh’s disgust
b. you may never see the way your house is piling up vomit-worthy practices and theories.

We are not all ears and need to be in our crooked generation

The ear-tingling threat is aimed at rebuking pride in the priesthood’s unique function and endurance. Considering that within a few years of Yeshua going back to glory the Church was under attack by a Jewish-leaning party, led by James and the Pharisees it is not out of character to find people who have tuned out Christ’s message nodding their heads and saying “yes, yes”. By the end of Paul’s ministry he was warning about people in the leadership devoted to injuring believers and encouraging alertness (Acts (20:31), saying, “I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them“. (Acts 20:29-30). No-one is asking you to forget that you have eyes, fingers, and a nose, but since God’s Son is the new Speaker a lot more ear needs to be given to him and less to the prophets and lawgivers.

Matthew 17:5 (compare Mark. 9:7 and Luke. 9:35) and Hebrews 1:2, confirm the need to have all ears tuned in to Yeshua.

11) The Lord said to Samuel, “Behold, I am about to do a thing in Israel at which both ears of everyone who hears it will tingle. 12) In that day I will carry out against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end.

1 Samuel 3:11-12

Bishops and entire faith communities supporting Nazism cannot deny they want a fuhrer

God’s voice, deposited in the Son of Man, has neither disguise nor partner, alternate perspectives nor partisan versions. If the news about what Eli’s sons were doing at the sacred tent broke today about a prominent figure in the nation or church (such as Eli was) we would be inundated by follow-up stories about one bad apple and the exceptional nature of the misbehaviour. Just as then, we would be smug in the zone of “we’re not that bad”. That smugness might last a few decades or even centuries, but eventually the truth has to come out. The whole of Judah, and the capital itself falls under intense scrutiny from on high. It must be the absence of a political template in either Judaism or Christianity that brings us to cherry pick aspects of the public face of Judaism and Christianity and call that Judeo-Christian. It must be also that we do not understand the essential nature of civic power and its interactions with the spiritual world. Exactly how many actions do we need to see from political leaders to convince us that an abominable like the Nazi leader of the 1930s and 1940s is practically always just around the corner. There cannot be any wisdom in even hinting at a solidarity between the Church and any of the parties all along the spectrum, no matter how like-minded they may seem. The fact that governments avenge injustice and punish evildoers does not make them partners we want to be lumped up with. I can see how religious leaders can think themselves in good company obeying every leader. Shopping for a Fuhrer among the hundreds of lawyer-pastors and pastor-lawyers just imploded on the choice of a failed mobster.

Jerusalem and Judah cleaned up by an ear-tingling act

If God insists that bad behaviour will have public attention and consequences it gets it, and no organization is exempt. All the positive thinking and agreement in prayer combined will not change the course or steer the vessel around God’s clean-up acts. You cannot positive-think or pray yourself (or anyone else) out of God’s plan and intervention.

12) therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Behold, I am bringing such calamity on Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears will tingle. 13) I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria and the plummet of the house of Ahab, and I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down.

2 Kings 21:12-13

Jerusalem’s Tingle

and say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem: thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, “Behold I am about to bring a calamity upon this place, at which the ears of everyone that hears of it will tingle.

Jeremiah 19:3

Exemptions to the Lord’s ear- tingling acts are nonexistent.   Everyone who hears of the holy city’s fortune will experience the tingle.

News for Samuel and Jeremiah

We in the twenty-first century are seeing reversals in leadership, many of which we may feel justified in attributing to God, but God’s hand in politics is now the fuel for idolatry and utter treachery. Those who have studiously denounced protest against government misbehavior have tried other backdoor methods of sneaking a religious agenda into politics. Failure is guaranteed if the Church is going to try to duplicate the state’s programs for improving the lives of church members without an equally vigrous strategy for affecting the lives of all without distinction. The familiar smells of the catastrophic moral failures of New Testament times and the gross darkness linger here in my slice of Turtle Island.

Who needs heroic magnates and perfecly physically fit humans in every other seat?

A Senate or Supreme Court packed with religous vigilantes will result in the same thing; an immoral, paranoid, and appallingly unstable society, deluded by chosen status and plagued by the love of money and the corrupt use of power, even though the duration of these conditions is at most less than a decade. If one of the political parties or religious groups had a superior claim – like the Jewish claim to Canaan as inheritance through the promises to Abraham – it does not take more than a year to figure out who that might be, because that (70 weeks, or 1.34 years) is exactly how much time the nation of priests has to get its act together. Whatever they call themselves – liberal, conservative, centrist or extreme, ancient or modern, religious or atheist – has not helped any of them to rise to acceptance as the right one for society.

“It is He who changes the times and the epochs; He removes kings and establishes kings; He gives wisdom to wise men And knowledge to men of understanding.

Daniel 2:21

Idols of state and people

There are so many intense distractions that have become commonplace that when people do and say the things God wants we are surprised and even outraged. When we do the opposite of what he wants we commend ourselves as obedient and triumphant. A lot of the passionate and uninformed messaging and whispering that have made their way into the public discourse are not responsible for any redemptive directions. The leaders who enjoy public elevation are complete juveniles, cowardly spiritual novices, fomentors of civic unrest and discontent disguised as moral outrage against the very things society does not need: hero-worship, business models dominating spiritual processes, and religious leaders prostituting themselves with secular theories and powers.

Kings, pastors, rabbis and imams

Who would have thought that God gives the reins to people like Pharoah, Saul, David, Solomon, Ezra, Herod, Caiaphas, kings , pastors, rabbis and imams, and takes them out in due season?

He does not expect us to think of what might happen or might have happened but about what happens when humans fall into the intoxicating influence.of secular and political power. We cannot be too careful avoiding the entanglements of what seems like real life nor ensuring that the no-one convinces us that the ABCs are the final report we need to hear and believe.

Unlike many of my peers I have made no commitment to a political party.  The day when political parties have no standing in the people’s house of deliberation will be a day when citizens can sleep without concern that they will wake up to hear that the head of government, federal or provincial, is a tool, witting or unwitting of  religion.  To some extent politicians have been tools of their communities, and that can be anything from a xenophobic cult to a deceitful tech corporation.  One does not need to be too creative to realize that a party no longer aspiring to live out its vision, and  sees both grand and old as its high calling has dropped out of the fray, and deserves no attention.  Having seen how low an adult grouping has sunk can  we say we have seen them all?

Living without a mind settles everything

Watching Governor Cuomo of New York and Premier Ford of Ontario come out daily since the spring of 2020 with transparency and diligence I used to believe that politicians were committed to science even as I saw the opposite in countries presumed to be progressive.  There can only be one such but they come in families.  It turns out that the Premier of Ontario is more of a defender of  business than he is of humans. It should be obvious that the conservative bent towards less government and more influence and resources is a wild world based on a fantasy. Mindless in some ways.

It is hard to change spots

Premier Ford wss able to convince Ontarians that he was following science and doung the right thing for the province.   It was such a contrast with him wanting to hold Ontario open for business, as if the province’s ID card read “shop” or “bordello”, we thought hed

The man who affirms every day that he will follow the science is busy undermining the efforts of conservation agencies in the Greater Toronto Area, right under our noses.  Did Mr. Ford and his conservatives think that people would not notice? Everyone who lives in Toronto has seen urban development making wildlife scarce and making irreplaceable land types disappear.

Change is hard

“Can the Ethiopian change his skin Or the leopard his spots? Then you also can do good Who are accustomed to doing evil.

Jeremiah 13:23

As usual, these political developments have parallels in the religious world.  It is not difficult to find religious leaders straddling the fence, too underdeveloped to discard the childish and elementary practices of spirituality, so greedy as to be evaluated as God’s exclusive  people, they lump the relevant with the irrelevant. They have not embraced the truth about Christ being the chosen spokesman for God.  They are willingly blind to the fact that the prophets (including Moses) are subject to what Christ ssys and does. It is utterly shameful for Christians to find redemption in any political party or ideology. Once we have seen one we have seen the whole family.

The UK is ripping itself from the bosom of NATO and the EU but its debate systems remain intact. The US on the other hand is ripping itself apart with a wholesale attack on every institution of governance, with constant threats to life and liberty, and with the astonishing assistance of outside powers to keep toxic and shameful slogans in the forefront. The turmoil in these two states is a major contributor to the deepening gloom of powerlessness by all the stakeholders. If we wanted convincing evidence that the world was coming to a place where we would hear God’s voice saying “See, there I told you there was nothing to all these superpowers!” we can find it in the UK and US upheavals.

United Bickering

The most important marker in the crises is the failure of unity. Despite calling themselves “United” and having legislation to ensure the harmonious functioning of state agencies both nations are plagued by division. Observers may feel that there is due diligence to prevent the decline of democracy, but there is also the sense that democracy neither pays the bills nor improves the lives of citizens. Perhaps the prosperity of China, with its fear of a liberated population, and the Islamic states with their imposition of religious observance have caught the attention of western people. The fly in the UK’s ointment is Ireland and the so-called backstop solution for England’s exit from the EU. Ireland just happens also to be England’s most recent experience of violent upheaval. The fly in the ointment of the United States are the two amendments to the Constitution that people are most loathe to control even for the good of everyone.

Not quite “Timber!” Yet

We may be tempted to keep our eyes on the economic and financial upheavals along with the dramatic and climactic to changes to the natural environment but it is something else that we need to pay attention to. The trail left by these two powers across the globe can be summarized in the UK’s creation of the state of Israel and it’s having abandoned the Palestinian people, leaving the process up to the United Nations where the United States has a veto to protect Israel.  These nations are by no means finished but it only takes a night to darkness to push the globe into its final birth pangs.

Finally! Exodus

Everything not secured by Messianic truth is now being swept away by the floods and winds of Earth’s birth pangs.  The great legal mountains, the mighty arsenals of the nations, the assemblies of merchants, and the religious alliances are all being shown to be helpless and still proud even after their treasures are thrown into the streets and after their demands for homage are shown to be blasphemous and aimed at oppressing the humble and the meek.

He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, And he who rules his spirit, than he who captures a city.

Proverbs 16:32

If these two are the examples of unity who needs parliament or president? Learning to control the tongue and firearms is the recommended solution

Knowing that Riches of Glorious Grace from our Heavenly Father continue let us be diligent to receive and share!

In addition to faith and love

… and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant, with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 1:14